Chapter 1: From Union Bund to Nation pp. 13-19

That which was formerly called the German youth movement [Jugend bewegung] is dead. This statement has nothing to do with ill will.

No youth leader of our time will deny the merits of the scout [Wandervogel] Karl Fischers in his work with the German youth movement. That youth movement was as right for its own time as the Hitler Youth is right for the present. Without any doubt, many ideas and the form of life [Lebensform] of the Youth Movement helped to create the prerequisites on which the H J is building: The idea of self-leadership on the part of the youth, the declaration to fight against the standards of bourgeois society, the will to folkdom, homeland, or comradeship and many others, are akin to the feelings of the H. J. And yet: The first step into public life, the meeting which took place on 11 and 12 October 1913 on the “Hohen Meissner”, remained only an impulse. The best thing about the speech on the “Hohen Meissner” were the people who listened to it [p. 14]. What today’s youth is looking for in this, for the youth movement so important meeting, is the sincere will to form, to create.

We, today, see clearer than the generation of that time that the value of their youth movement was in their silent work. The greater German idea and the really valuable return to folkdom and simplicity are achievements of the youth movement which seem to us more significant than the numerous manifestoes which were handed down to us. They had the courage to let themselves be ridiculed, a courage which the National Socialist Fighter of a decade later also had to have. And we must, if we want to do justice to this youth movement, look less to the picture of their actual appearance but more to the determination with which they followed their ideals. The political reality of youth was their cleanness, their decent behaviour, their political change [Umbruch]. The Youth movement was one of the few pleasant phenomena of the Wilhelmman era and it is characteristic for that time that youth was so delightful because it declared war on its time. Few leagues [Buende] of the postwar time have a right to refer to the former youth movement. They were a true copy of its weaknesses without its virtues. They ignored the lesson of the great war. They forgot that the time of a free and easy youth movement had undergone a break by the death of two million, which imposed on them the duties of unity and masculine constraint [Gebundenheit und maennliche Zucht--p. 15]. What was right up to 1 August 1914 was wrong after 9 November 1918.

Some attempts were made to create a synthesis of youth and a militant movement [Wehrbewegung], attempts which started from the right principles. These attempts failed because their leaders were either representatives of pure militarism or at best of some lesser political ideas. Therefore, it was reserved to Adolf Hitler, the creator and supporter of an ideology [Weltanschauung], to determine the road of German youth. From the former youth movement the Hitler youth took over this or that form, out of the front of the World War it was given its content by Adolf Hitler. Its organization also has its prerequisite in the great war; its bearing is military, as was the bearing of those who came from the youth movement and who died in their gray coats in Flanders.

Just as the youth of the “Hohen Meissner” felt, the front as the more important, so do we. Between the summer of 1914 and the spring of today lies a long dreary time through which we all passed consciously or unconsciously. Even those of us who had not been born at that time know it, every German knows it. As long as the German people will live, this time will live in their minds [p. 16].

That at that time a whole nation stood in arms, Catholics and Protestants, beggars and millionaires, peasants and clerks, merchants and laborers, and that they all obeyed one will and were only Germans, nothing but Germans, that also started us on the march. No title, no privilege of birth, not a lot of money nor anything special of any kind made a difference then.

We also want the same thing. The black years of war have passed, the spirit of the warrior remains. Again youth in Germany does not want profits, nor personal gain, but renders service and sacrifices to the community. That is the idea of the HJ: A comradeship of those Germans who do not want anything for themselves. Because they do not want anything for themselves they can do everything for their great nation. Not a youth with new rights--a generation of strict fulfillment of duty.

The postwar period showed a sad picture of party-bound youth. “Whoever controls youth, controls the future” was the slogan, given the German National club to the Communist thieves’ den. Every lobby was dealing in youth. And they were successful. Young Germany took everything for gospel truth, sold itself today to this one, tomorrow to that one till finally, disappointed and disgusted, it turned its back on all these activities. Then came the time of exclusive sports, of exclusive indulging in entertainments and living to the fullest, the time of exclusive study, [p. 17]. “Politics is nonsense,” was the reply given to party functionaries.

When Adolf Hitler began to speak this attitude was shaken. But now the satisfied citizen used the same argument which youth had found against him. He called for peace, for self-possession, for order. “Youth should not mix in politics,” because the defensive slogan of all the bourgeois parties which began to lose their young people to the Fuehrer. Anyone who at that time, 1924-25, among youth stood up for Adolf Hitler might have found that even youth leaders anxiously tried to avoid the alleged danger of influencing youth politically in the direction of National Socialism. Many comrades and I myself had to leave a militant organization [Wehrorganisation] to which I had become quite attached, because I had made a speech for Adolf Hitler there. At that time, many, like myself drew a dividing line between themselves and their friends and relatives and exchanged fight for the new ideal for the quiet life of a well protected home.

We were not yet able to account for our conception in detail, we simply believed. And when Hitler’s book, “Mein Kampf” was published it was our bible which we almost learned by heart in order to be able to answer the questions of the doubters and superior critics. Almost every one who today is leading youth in a responsible position joined us during those years [p. 18].

Again Youth was divided by politics but this time the problem was different. It was no longer a matter of national parties, of liberal and democratic ideas, it was this: Germany or Marxism, Germany or reaction. But youth also had been slightly infected with party ideas. Youth did not want to be convinced, it wanted to be overruled. Not the accuracy of the idea was questioned, but an attempt was made to prove that with such a small following it could not be successful. The National Socialist movement was regarded as a fractional party, the honest but, because of its pettiness, hopeless attempt of a man of whom it was not known if he had the necessary knowledge, the essential education. A bricklayer from Vienna, a man without college education, a self-taught person should liberate Germany? That was at best very doubtful.

As there are old people who are young, there are also among the youth some who are old. I have met them in the universities, in the youth movement, everywhere. The people who are old in their hearts are like a pestilence to a healthy people. They represent the tenacious and embittered resistance against every new idea. But youth is an attitude. The paralyzed Chamberlain whose lips are forming words which only his wife can read and transcribe represents eternal youth as much as the old Goethe in his last days. His Faust, the Ninth Symphony and the will of Adolf Hitler are eternal youth and know neither time nor death [p. 19].

Yet there are men who are born old and are living their lives as if they were 70 years old. During the years of our fight we overcame those people and we fight them again and again. They are the living dead. Their coldness kills every slight stir of a new life. Only the collective force of passionate youth is able to destroy them.

Let us do away with the old! Only eternal youth shall have its home _in our Germany_.